They've also got This is Us, and Ordinary Joe, although I guess Ordinary Joe is kinda borderline since in one of the three timelines he's a nurse.
Will Sam Beckett Return Home? NBC Orders Quantum Leap Reboot Pilot
- Thread starter Ryan Thomas Riddle
- Start date
I have lots of thoughts on this. Quantum Leap is my favorite television series. It was a specific formula and format that made it work. Trying to alter that too much to fit current long form storytelling could be a big mistake.
I am optimistic because Deborah Pratt writer and producer confirmed this on her personal Instagram. She was also Creator Don Bellisario’s wife when the show was on. They had children together but long ago divorced.
For this to have been green lighted any legal rights must have been resolved. Clearly Universal owns rights. But I have long suspected that Bellisario and Pratt’s divorce was an added complication to all this. I meet them both at a QL convention in 2009. They did not appear together and had different descriptions of what the current status of future revival attempts were. Don was committed to doing a feature that he would write himself. He said he always envisioned Sam and Al being played by Scott and Dean.
Deborah wanted a tv series focused on Sam’s daughter Sammie Jo. Which she created in the original to spin off. As writer she would own that character. Honestly her backstory is way too complicated to build a series around. Only fans who saw the original 3 parter would understand how she is Sam’s daughter.
Apparently a film was close to happening but Universal got worried about Brand confusion when Quantum of Solace came out. Seriously!
Though the title was a problem when original series was on too. Many
people in general audiences did not know what it meant.
Another detail. There was an alternate ending of the finale. Which actually showed Al and Beth married in present day. Years ago a small part leaked online showing them in a picture with their daughters. When Don and Scott appeared together at the convention - when Don was asked about that he was clearly annoyed and looked to Scott and said “ I wonder who put that out!” Can not be sure but I assumed he was referring to Deborah. Divorce can be messy. It appears whatever issues they had professionally have been put aside for this.
In recent years set photos turned up and show even more was filmed. Showing Al tell Beth that Sam is lost in time. That he needs to time travel himself to find him. All that was shot to setup a new premise if the show is show had gotten renewed for 6th season. But cancellation lead to it being cut and the finale we got. If that footage still exists maybe it could be used to explain Al’s absence. At the very least I hope Susan Diol appears as Al’s wife Beth.
I am optimistic because Deborah Pratt writer and producer confirmed this on her personal Instagram. She was also Creator Don Bellisario’s wife when the show was on. They had children together but long ago divorced.
For this to have been green lighted any legal rights must have been resolved. Clearly Universal owns rights. But I have long suspected that Bellisario and Pratt’s divorce was an added complication to all this. I meet them both at a QL convention in 2009. They did not appear together and had different descriptions of what the current status of future revival attempts were. Don was committed to doing a feature that he would write himself. He said he always envisioned Sam and Al being played by Scott and Dean.
Deborah wanted a tv series focused on Sam’s daughter Sammie Jo. Which she created in the original to spin off. As writer she would own that character. Honestly her backstory is way too complicated to build a series around. Only fans who saw the original 3 parter would understand how she is Sam’s daughter.
Apparently a film was close to happening but Universal got worried about Brand confusion when Quantum of Solace came out. Seriously!
Though the title was a problem when original series was on too. Many
people in general audiences did not know what it meant.
Another detail. There was an alternate ending of the finale. Which actually showed Al and Beth married in present day. Years ago a small part leaked online showing them in a picture with their daughters. When Don and Scott appeared together at the convention - when Don was asked about that he was clearly annoyed and looked to Scott and said “ I wonder who put that out!” Can not be sure but I assumed he was referring to Deborah. Divorce can be messy. It appears whatever issues they had professionally have been put aside for this.
In recent years set photos turned up and show even more was filmed. Showing Al tell Beth that Sam is lost in time. That he needs to time travel himself to find him. All that was shot to setup a new premise if the show is show had gotten renewed for 6th season. But cancellation lead to it being cut and the finale we got. If that footage still exists maybe it could be used to explain Al’s absence. At the very least I hope Susan Diol appears as Al’s wife Beth.
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I think there's a world in which you can remain true to the anthology/episodic format, but still employ an overarching plot and purpose to the whole thing. It'll probably mean more character and story development of the present day/waiting room/project side, but that's not inherently a bad thing.
The easy way around that is to simply not address it. All newcomers need to know is that Sam is her father (or grandfather if we're going with the idea that Sammy Jo is too old for the role now), that he's been missing for a long time, and this is a last ditch desperate attempt to bring him home. Long time fans would know the full context of the story, while newcomers flat out do not need to know the details.
I guess you could still have Sammy Jo on the show by putting her in the hologram role, giving it more of a mother/daughter dynamic between her and the leaper (who I have just decided should be named Alberta "Alie" Beckett, because, why not!)
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If Sam had a kid, which he did in the books, then that kid can jump within Sam's life time, with only a small tweak to the system.
Like how Sam went to the Civil War, and the Temporal Cold war.
It did and it didn't. "God" was just one possibility the show put forth for what was causing him to leap. IIRC others included "time", "destiny", and "whatever". "Kali", "Budda", "aliens", and "random five dimensional void fluctuations in the quantum foam propagating through the space-time continuum" would all also hold equal standing in terms of possible culprits.
The point being that it was meant to be a mystery; the kind you never want the characters to actually solve or even hold strong opinions on because any definitive answer only makes it less interesting, not more.
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It was Loki.
Agreed. Also Sam and Al called themselves “God’s Cleanup Crew” in one episode. Most religions would see it as total blasphemy that the central premise of the show is God made mistakes in the past. Which requires time travelers to fix.
It’s best left a mystery. I have noticed over the years the show is a bit of Rorschach Test based on individual viewers beliefs. Very devout Christians see it as a religious show. Donald Bellisario calls himself very socially liberal. Though more conservative when it came to the military. Given that he served in the Marine Corps. All of which is evident in his writing on the show.
One thing though is we know the Devil is real in the universe. Granted so are aliens,bigfoot,vampires and mummies. We also had a Guardian Angel in the Taxi episode and Bruce McGill in the series final. To me the show never felt super religious though so I give it that. But I think it was no small part of the show. Just not on the level of something like Seventh Heaven or Touched by a Angel. The show wanted to be fun and also wanted a character like Al who could have a good time personality.
I'd class all those things (plus whoever was driving the evil leaper's missions) under the same "paranormal" category. In the broad sense that there's more going on than can be immediately quantified, let alone explained. Again though, it's best to leave such things a mysteries and vague implications than anything specifically defined. It's the old "sinister scratching at the door" principle. So long as the door stays closed it could be *anything*, but once you open the door and see it's a 6 foot tall bug, well . . . at least it's not a 9 foot tall bug!
The reality will never be as weird or mysterious as one's imagination. Is Same just travelling through time, or is he also operating on some esoteric etheric plane where seemingly intelligent entities from elsewhere interact with our universe across our 4 dimensional perceptions. Is Sam just like one of Sagan's flat paper people encountering a 3 dimensional apple for the first time and unable to perceive it's entirety, only able to glimpse aspects of it? Is he by dint of his temporal disassociation able to suddenly perceive the universe from the outside, and get a glimpse of illusory volume on the surface of which the hologram that is our universe is inscribed?
Doesn't matter. Best left a mystery.
Also, that thing being "the devil" is dubious at best. I mean we only have it's word for what it was and it can hardly said to be a trustworthy source, one way or the other. Hell, I'd put money on that thing being the same thing Bruce McGill played in the finale, just viewed in a different aspect.
How's this for an outlandish theory:
Al the bartender, from the final episode, is VOY's Captain Braxton.
Yeah, you read that right.
I mean, I know it's the same actor (Bruce McGill) but I posit that it's the same character as well.
To wit: After Braxton is put on trial for his crimes ("Relativity"), he undergoes rehabilitation and is offered the choice of time periods in which to live out his retirement. He chooses the early 1950's, and builds the bar. Since he can no longer travel in time on his own, he resolves to help others to do so...
As for the devil: I have no problem believing that it is, in fact, the devil. If Al the bartender, and those who leap for him, are agents of God, then Lothos and his ilk could be the reverse. Seems simple enough.
Al the bartender, from the final episode, is VOY's Captain Braxton.
Yeah, you read that right.
I mean, I know it's the same actor (Bruce McGill) but I posit that it's the same character as well.
To wit: After Braxton is put on trial for his crimes ("Relativity"), he undergoes rehabilitation and is offered the choice of time periods in which to live out his retirement. He chooses the early 1950's, and builds the bar. Since he can no longer travel in time on his own, he resolves to help others to do so...
As for the devil: I have no problem believing that it is, in fact, the devil. If Al the bartender, and those who leap for him, are agents of God, then Lothos and his ilk could be the reverse. Seems simple enough.
But the showrunners from La Brea working on this also worked on God Friended Me, another show where God or someone posing as God played an instrumental part with no definitive answers as to whether it was really a(n understable) higher power at work.
And? To paraphrase the God entity from Futurama "if you've done everything properly, no one will be sure you've done anything at all."
I'm curious if they'll pick on the whole set up with their being a bunch of good & evil Leapers out there constantly fixing and damaging the timeline that they introduced in the finale. That would be the perfect way to set up an overarching conflict, and introduce recurring allies and enemies without having to keep going back to the same places or times.
I really like this idea. This solves a lot of "Hollywood problems."
This "solves" the "problem" of older folks in a lead role (I am 49), by having the person most passionate about this (the mom) still involved, but still having the younger lead. And the parent dynamics can easily lead to dramatic conflict. After seeing Ghostbusters Afterlife... this could totally work.
Also, the granddaughter ought to be of mixed race, which helps add the dversity that wasn't always present, and can open it up to MANY types of actresses.
To quote Pitch Meeting guy, it's "super easy, barely an inconvenience". Having a mixed heritage actress (which i would route for, as half-Indonesian) would help on one end, and the other, IF they take nonwhite writers very seriously and involved in the process.... it could make for some extremely relevent commentary, and avoid the criticism we might have today where it would be obvious white people wrote it. ( @TREK_GOD_1 can tell you how that fails on Batwoman)
Well, maybe instead of leaping within her lifetime, she can leap within the lifetime of the city of Chicago. Hmm... label it Chicago TIme or Chicago Leap? Quantum Chicago?
True that a respectful religious angle is rare today (like Spiderman No way Home's "dressed as a cool youth pastor" and Jimmy Woo Youth Pastor joke is the closest mainstream respect I have seen....well, maybe The Shack)...but i don't think QL was really all that religious in tone. Not disrespectful, but more neutral (like TOS seemed to be)
I watched the first few seasons, but missed the last couple by and large. I don't see it as a particularly religious show... definitely no Highway to Heaven....and maybe less so than TOS (which had a least one shout out to Jesus). ANd i don't recall any evangelical support (or hate) of QL.
It wouldn't be "blasphemy" if God were using Sam to fix what the Devil messed up.
But from what i understand, that stuff could easily be re-interpreted to not sound so Christian, and the "God thing" was really "explicit" in just the finale, no?
Didn't Scott Bakula joke about ending NCIS New Orleans with a little QT kind of easter egg?
I always thought the bartender in the final episode was supposed to be GTFW (God Fate Time Whatever) a sort of amalgamation of everything godlike without calling him "God" and that was my take on the final episode in the bar.
I always thought the bartender in the final episode was supposed to be GTFW (God Fate Time Whatever) a sort of amalgamation of everything godlike without calling him "God" and that was my take on the final episode in the bar.
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I've always liked the notion that the bartender was Sam's future self, who'd been leaping so long that he'd transcended time, could control the leaps . . . and was indeed the one that yoinked Sam out of the accelerator chamber, because what good time travel story doesn't have a predestination paradox? 
I've always liked the notion that the bartender was Sam's future self, who'd been leaping so long that he'd transcended time, could control the leaps . . . and was indeed the one that yoinked Sam out of the accelerator chamber, because what good time travel story doesn't have a predestination paradox?
I can't remember the first season of this one or the pilot episode, did they ever mention him being yoinked out of the accelerator, or was that only mentioned in the final episode?
How was that even supposed to work? Did he swap places with the people he leaped into, I mean we see Sam in the episodes as the people he leaps into but what to other people around him see?
There was an old long-running parody fanfiction series that used this idea.
And then he was on Rizzoli & Isles too and still Captain Braxton